00:04Hello everyone. My name is Anne Bela Vance. I'm the National President of Women's Federation
00:12for World Peace Australia, which is a national chapter of Women's Federation for World Peace
00:20International. And just say hello to all of our icons of change people out there and a very big
00:28thank you for this nomination for the award. But especially I want to add that it isn't my award,
00:39it's our award. We are all volunteers here in Australia and we have amazing women joining us,
00:51volunteers and professionals who are volunteering their time in all of our projects. So this award
01:00isn't just for me, it's also for them.
01:07Our vision is One Global Family. So this comes from Women's Federation for World
01:15Peace International. And our global themes each year also come from Women's Federation International.
01:24And I guess you could say the philosophy behind the organisation is living for the sake of others.
01:34If we want to have peace, we can't have peace if we're just standing on our side of the fence.
01:41We can only have peace if we serve those around us. And that starts within the family and then spreads
01:49out.
01:54The oldest one are our books for the islands, which has been going since 2012. And most people don't realise
02:07one, many towns, villages don't have electricity, let alone having books for the children in primary
02:18schools or secondary schools. So we've been supplying good quality secondhand books to start up libraries in primary schools.
02:32Next one are our microcredit loans and training. So I've done training for women entrepreneurs,
02:40prospective entrepreneurs who would never be able to gain a loan from a bank and do the training on running
02:51a small business. And then from that, those who qualify, we have a certain rubric tick box.
02:59Those who qualify, the top ones, they're able to receive a micro loan at very, very low rates.
03:07And the idea is that that is paid back. So then it is passed on to the next group of
03:16women. And at the moment,
03:18we have 20 women in the Solomon Islands who have received micro loans to start up small businesses.
03:27Next one is solar lights. So this is a picture of a small village on Tanna Island in Vanuatu,
03:36just explaining the villages that don't have electricity, which is most of them. And because
03:44it's very close to the equator, there's 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness. So having some
03:52lighting, one to help children do their homework or to read, another for the women to run little home-based
04:03businesses to cook and etc, etc, really is helpful. We have total university scholarships. At the moment,
04:14we have five, four women and five, one man receiving the scholarship. And these scholarships are the whole
04:24time of the university because if we could not fund them, then they would stop. And this young lady,
04:34she's actually graduated. Our next report in our newsletter is her graduation as a nurse.
04:45And another one are our women's sewing centres. We have probably sent all the
04:55good quality sewing machines in Australia out to the Pacific Islands. We were the number one hit,
05:05but we've stopped doing this now. We've set up many women's sewing centres in many nations.
05:16The first one are our environment campaigns. We do two a year and they're very easy for us because we
05:24partner with other organisations, Clean Up Australia Day in March and Beach Patrol. We usually do it in June,
05:32which parallels with World Ocean Day and we get out in the community, meet new people and do something that
05:44is very rewarding. And then afterwards, we meet up and have coffee together.
05:54The other one is our Global Women's Peace Network. This is actually a project from Women's
06:00Federation International. So all around the world, these are being conducted. What is unique for us is that
06:09we are only focusing on women's leadership and our goal is to raise up the next generation of
06:19emerging women leaders focusing on leadership of the heart.
06:26We attach to that one too. We do our Global Awards at that time during the Assembly. Our Global Women
06:34Peace Ambassador Awards. They're for women who are doing substantial work in the community for peace
06:43building and also our global partners. And that one lines up very nicely with Global Goal 17
06:52partnerships for the goals. Organisations. This one is for organisations that work with us quite
07:00substantially in developing our projects and the global goals. So here's the mentor program. So in the
07:10GWPN Assembly, we invite our mentors and our mentees. The mentor program is called Leading into
07:20the Future to the Future. So there you'll see one of our mentees and mentors together at the Assembly. And
07:29it's a six
07:30month program, one-on-one mentoring with an established woman leader and a mentee. It doesn't matter what
07:40age actually for the mentees. They're just emerging women leaders. And we match them up based on
07:50their expertise and what they're seeking. But it is definitely a leadership of the heart program where
07:58women can feel comfortable in their own skin, bringing out the feminine attributes,
08:05not feeling they have to compete with men and working side by side with the men. Not against, not above,
08:14not below, definitely side by side. And we know absolutely that when more women are involved in
08:21boards, there are better outcomes. And when there's more women involved in peace building,
08:27the peace is longer lasting and more sustainable. We also host the Melbourne Pacifica Festival,
08:37which is always the first Saturday of December, beginning the holiday season. And we did that
08:45because we have our global development aid and service projects in the Pacific. And we thought,
08:51right, it's time that we connect with our Pacific Islanders here. And this is the only festival where
08:58all of them come together. And each year it gets bigger and bigger and more and more fun.
09:06In New South Wales, the chapter, they run a youth council, young women aged 18 to 30,
09:16a lot of them are university students. And they have projects and activities that they organise and run
09:25together. I would like to really thank you for the nomination for this award. But as I mentioned before,
09:40it's not just my award, it's all of our awards. Our volunteers have dedicated their time in developing
09:51our projects and our events. Since 1992, we have been going and in Australia since 1994. So,
10:01thank you very much and look forward to hearing from you soon.
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